No: 204 January 2012 Number 204 January 2012 INSIDE 4 Pleased to meet you Michael Druiett 5 Richard Wagner Verband Extraordinary Assembly Andrea Buchanan 5 Essential Wagner: Melos Roger Lee 6 Berlin Ring : 9th to 18th September Paul Dawson-Bowling 8 Berlin Ring : 20th to 24th September Robert Mitchell 10 Opera North Rheingold at Salford Katie Barnes 12 Edinburgh Players Opera Group: “ Scotterdämmerung ” Roger Lee 13 A young heldentenor Jonathan Finney 14 A sort of alchemy Hugh Bolton 14 A Wagnerian blogger Rob Saunders 15 On singing Brünnhilde Kimberley Myers 16 Ross Alley: “I still owe the world a Tannhäuser .” Jeremy D Rowe 16 Concert at the Royal College of Music Jeremy D Rowe 17 Die Walküre at Saint Endillion David Ross 18 Der fliegende Hollander at Covent Garden Katie Barnes 20 Interview with Alwyn Mellor Michael Bousfield 22 UK premiere of Wagner Dream by Jonathan Harvey Barbican Music Team 27 Der Ring Edinburgh residential summer school Derek Watson 28 Rehearsal Orchestra: Scenes from Götterdämmerung Paul Dawson-Bowling Meirion Bowen 31 Der fliegende Holländer in Liège Jeremy D Rowe 32 Siegfried cinema relay from the New York Met Ewen Harris 34 Oxford Wagner Society Orchestra concert Andrea Buchanan 35 Magdalen Ashman shines at St James Piccadilly Jeremy D Rowe 35 An evening of Wagner at Queen’s Gate Terrace Jeremy D Rowe 36 Mastersingers Bayreuth Bursary Competition Day Katie Barnes 39 Bursary Competition: Let’s hear it from the Singers! Andrea Buchanan 42 From Wotan to Bluebeard with Sir John David Edwards 43 Seattle Opera’s Speight Jenkins honoured Malcolm Rivers 44 Liederabend: Song recital at St Paul’s Church Covent Garden 45 Mastersingers Presteigne weekend: Rogues and Lovers in Opera, Verse and Art 46 Letter: No thank you, Bayreuth Giles du Boulay Cover: Helena Dix, winner of the Wagner Society 2012 Bayreuth Bursary Competition Photography and Design by Peter West: [email protected] 01256 322 339 –2– EDITOR’S NOTE “Experiencing Wagner’s Ring is like living one’s life several times over.” So writes Meirion Bowen on page 30 of this issue in response to the Rehearsal Orchestra workshop of scenes from Götterdämmerung with young singers of the Mastersingers company at the Henry Wood Hall. With a kaleidoscope of careers in music which include prodigy organist, distinguished music teacher, music critic for the Guardian and many other publications, musical assistant to Sir Michael Tippett, mentor to a legion of young musicians and associate of Nicholas Cleobury and Sir Colin Davis, Meirion Bowen can speak with authority about “living one’s life several times.” Bowen’s opening sentence: “Great Wagner performances need long term preparation” refers to the fact that those events such as the Henry Wood Hall Götterdämmerung which so distinguish the UK Wagner Society among its worldwide siblings represent the very process of “long term preparation” whose aim is to produce the great Wagner performances of the future. Whether it is explicitly stated in these pages or not, Sir John Tomlinson, Dame Anne Evans and Malcolm Rivers have powerfully contributed to the outcomes of more than a dozen events and personal reflections which are reported in this issue alone. Thanks to our well-established symbiosis with the Mastersingers the Wagner Society can take pride in its role in developing a lengthy catalogue of now established Wagnerian performers from Bryn Terfel to James Rutherford, Alwyn Mellor, Andrew Rees, Rachel Nicholls, Stuart Pendred and many more who have taken part in our programme of “long-term preparation” toward that goal of helping to produce the “great Wagner performances” of our time. As for the future, the Edinburgh Opera Players production of Götterdämmerung (pages 12 to 15), and the riches of talent displayed on the Bayreuth Bursary day (pages 36 to 41) tell abundantly of our response as a Society to the need to provide a future generation of Wagnerian artists with the “long term preparation” about which Merion Bowen writes. –3– Pleased to meet you MICHAEL DRUIETT The big discovery from Britain’s Wagner-rich summer was Mastersingers Company alumnus Michael Druiett as Wotan in Das Rheingold for Opera North. Paul Dawson-Bowling wrote in the October Wagner News: “I cannot sufficiently praise the Wotan of Michael Druiett who invoked all the gravity and authority of the role and also sang it superlatively and brought out its high drama. His voice is clean-cut and pure in intonation, but his heldenbariton flexibility has an added seasoning from the dark, rich hues of a true bass. It beggars belief that Michael Druiett is not snapped up for appearances at the Met, Bayreuth, Paris, Seattle – everywhere.” On page 10 of this issue Katie Barnes writes: “Michael Druiett’s Wotan ruled the stage with effortless authority and he sang with beautiful bronzed tone in excellent German. On this showing he has the potential to become a major heldenbariton. It will be good to see how he develops the character vocally and dramatically.” Michael told Wagner News: “The role of Wotan means so much to me. It is everything I have spent twenty years in the profession waiting to do. It has been a wonderful journey during which I have learned so much about myself and my singing. (I think I have found the reason why I have been given a 6’ 6” frame and a voice!) So many people said that this would be me and I could be a successful exponent of the role. I am so thrilled that my first run at it in this concert format has been so well received. “At English National Opera. I was a very young and inexperienced singer and Malcolm Rivers did his best to keep me on the straight and narrow! I first came into contact with the Wagner Society six or seven years ago when I was starting my transition from bass to heldenbariton. I entered the Bayreuth Bursary Competition with my first sketch of Wotan’s farewell and came runner up. I was invited back for the concert ‘From Busetto to Bayreuth’ with my old friend from Welsh National Opera, Anthony Negus. I have to say a big ’thank you’ to the Mastersingers Company for enabling me to study Das Rheingold with the wonderful Philip Thomas. Philip was one of those who said that this was the role I would sing one day. His emphasis on its lieder-like lyrical aspects showed me how Wotan is more that standing there shouting and bawling, and I was pleased to read how people had appreciated my interpretation. “John Tomlinson and I worked together before the two September performances and he was so supportive and positive. John is such a hero and somebody I have had the great pleasure of sharing the stage with for twenty odd years. Two particular highlights were when I shone my lamp as Nightwatchman in the Covent Garden Meistersinger and spent a lot of time listening to his great Hans Sachs unfolding, and another was Pelléas at Glyndebourne as the Doctor with John’s extraordinary Golaud. We spent an hour on the first page of Wotan’s music! His insight into the character and the music was fascinating and every so often a priceless discovery would emerge for me. Above all, to be told by the greatest living Wotan: ‘yes, you can do this, and do it well’ was a wonderful compliment. I plan to continue with the other two parts of Wotan with Sir John as mentor.” [email protected] –4– REPORT ON THE EXTRAORDINARY DELEGATE ASSEMBLY OF THE RICHARD WAGNER VERBAND INTERNATIONAL E.V. Frankfurt am Main, October 9th 2011 Andrea Buchanan As a result of unfinished business and requests from delegates at the annual assembly held in Wroclaw in May 2011 the Executive Committee called for an Extraordinary Assembly to be held in October. Representing our Society I joined delegates from 45 other Wagner Societies. There were two candidates for the election of Treasurer: Finn Elkjær of Copenhagen and Horst Eggers of Bayreuth. Mr. Eggers was elected by 24 votes to 19, with 1 abstention. There then ensued a long and complex discussion of the issues arising from the Wroclaw meeting and of the dissatisfaction in certain quarters with the way these issues were subsequently minuted. These related to the disagreement between Vice President Thomas Krakow and the former Treasurer Hubert Glomm of Bayreuth. Eventually it was agreed that the Wroclaw minutes be updated to address these concerns. President Professor Märtson then announced the unanimous committee decision to withdraw the application that had been made in Wroclaw to amend the statutes of the RWVI and to replace these with Statutes of Procedure. The rest of the meeting concerned suggestions as to how future Congresses should be organised, delegates’ agreement to the 2015 Congress being held in Dessau to coincide with their “Bauhaus” Ring, further details of the Congresses in Leipzig (2013) and Graz (2014), matters pertaining to the Scholarship Foundation and the mailing of the annual reports book to member societies. The minutes are available (by email only) on request from the Secretary, Andrea Buchanan, if members would like to know more. [email protected] ESSENTIAL WAGNER MELOS Roger Lee On page 7 Paul Dawson-Bowling writes: “Robert Dean Smith sang Winterstürme wichen dem Wonnemond and much else with an incomparable legato, somehow taking its phrasing through all Wagner’s awkward consonants which break up his beautiful melos.” As a conductor Richard Wagner felt that the job should consist of more than that of simply beating time. One had to go beyond the notes to penetrate and extract its meaning, its essence, its soul. Referring to this as the “melos” of the music he wrote: “you cannot know the tempo of a piece unless you know the melos, unless you hear the underlying melody”.